BY PATRICK MGBODO/JUMAI NWACHUKWU
THE heavy downpour on Tuesday, which should have been a blessing, turned tragic for the Issele-Azagba Community in the Aniocha North Local Government Area as lightning struck 12 footballers and their referee, killing two.
The Pointer gathered that the tragic incident which occurred at about 6 pm on that ill-fated day involved 13 youths who were playing football (six aside) at the Osemeke Primary School field in Issele-Azagba.
Narrating their ordeal to our correspondents, one of the survivors, Samuel Chukwudi, said they were playing football as usual before the rain started in drizzles when the lightning struck all 13 players on the pitch.
His words, ‘’Suddenly, lightning struck and all of us collapsed. It felt as if I was hit with a big block at the back of my neck and I fell. When I regained consciousness, I saw that other players were lying motionless too. I managed to get up and ran out of the field.
‘’Other players hit by the lightning started regaining consciousness one after the other and leaving the pitch too. But somehow, we realized that three of our teammates, Lucky, Bright and Onyeka did not wake. That was when we rushed them to the hospital’’ he said.
Chukwudi said two of the players were pronounced dead at the El-Comfort Hospital in Asaba after several hospitals refused to admit them. ‘’When we got to El-Comfort, they said it was already too late for the two boys. They confirmed them dead’’
However, some sort of miracle occurred in the vehicle on their way to the hospital as Chukwudi said ‘’one of the three victims started moving and began to cry. He is currently in the hospital receiving treatment. ‘’
‘’After that, we took the other two to the mortuary. We went to St Joseph’s Hospital and we were told that there was no space. They directed us to Asaba Specialist Hospital and they also said they do not have space. We had to drive down to Mother and Child Hospital in Ubulu-Okiti’’ he said.
Corroborating Chukwudi, the elder brother of the deceased Lucky, Maro Yara said when the lightning stuck, all players on the field collapsed for about seven minutes before they regained consciousness gradually. ‘’It was like a movie’’.
‘’Two persons died. We took them to several hospitals yesterday (Tuesday). From around 6 pm when the tragedy occurred and we went to Asaba, we returned at about 2 am (Wednesday morning). No mortuary agreed to admit them except Mother and Child Hospital where my brother’s corpse has been deposited’’ Yara said.
Reacting to the calamity, the President General of Issele-Azagba Development Union (IDU), Chief Patrick Isichei and an Assistant Headmaster of Osemeke Primary School, Mr Joseph Ojei, regretted the tragedy.
Chief Isichei dismissed insinuations that the unusual tragedy might have a spiritual connotation. ‘’Everybody is entitled to his opinion. But this, as I want to believe, is a natural disaster. It can happen anywhere. We have tsunamis and earthquakes. These things happen. But if there are spiritual undertones to this in Issele-Azagba, I do not know’’.
